Bengals rookie quarterback Andy Dalton has outpaced expectations through two weeks of the regular season, so much so that the Carson Palmer era officially appears to be over. But Dalton, who has thrown for 413 yards, completed 66.1 percent of his passes, and tossed three touchdowns and no interceptions, will be without second-year wide receiver Jordan Shipley for the rest of the year.

Shipley, out of the University of Texas, will be placed on injured reserve after tearing his ACL against Denver Sunday, head coach Marvin Lewis announced. CBSSports.com Rapid Reporter Paul Dehner adds that Andre Caldwell, who was splitting reps with Shipley in the slot, will now take the majority of snaps with help from Brandon Tate.

Tate was signed off waivers after the Patriots released him prior to Week 1.

Shipley had to be helped off the field after Broncos cornerback Cassius Vaughn tackled him low, but Lewis had no problem with the play.

"That was just a tackle," said Lewis. "The way the game is put together now if he were hit helmet-to-helmet or shoulder-to-helmet it would have been a play that came in violation of some of our rules now. So down low is legal."

As a rookie, Shipley caught 52 passes for 600 yards and three touchdowns.

Dan Pompei of the National Football Post has some interesting info in his Sunday Blitz though, especially the fact that he hears the apathy in Cincy is a "one-way street." (Running east from Palmer to Brown.)

Reportedly, the team is "taking Palmer off the hook" for his shoddy performance last year and pinning his lack of success on the people that surrounded the quarterback offensively. Pompei writes that the team will "try to rectify the situation by making sure the locker room understands Palmer is the only leader."

Now, without pointing fingers, um, "Terrell Owens." It's also possible that the Bengals could dump Chad Ochocinco, although it might be difficult to put him in the "best situation" with just youngsters Jordan Shipley and Jermaine Gresham serving as receiving options.

Bottom line is this: the Bengals truly believe that Palmer hasn't lost a step performance-wise (arm strength, etc.) and is capable of returning to Pro Bowl form in 2011.

Which may explain why Ochocinco and Owens took to Twitter immediately following the game to exchange a series of barbs about how they were both to blame for the loss (even though they didn't play).

It started with what appears to be a Kanye West-Taylor Swift joke:

And then escalated with this series:

Now, it appears that they're smack-talking each other across Twitter, even though neither of them played and, really, neither seems likely to come back to the Bengals in 2011.

What might be more likely, though, is that, because they know they're not coming back, the two wideouts are lashing out at everyone who tried to say that the Bengals were terrible offensively only because Ochocinco and Owens were on the field.

Either way, it appears pretty obvious that Ocho and T.O. will be taking their talents elsewhere in the coming season. The only question is who'll want to put up with drama?

On Sunday, CBS Sports' Charley Casserly reported on The NFL Today that Palmer will return but Owens will not.

"First of all, Carson Palmer will be back as the quarterback next year," Casserly said. "Now, who he's going to throw to, I think you'll see some changes. Terrell Owens will not be back, the act has worn thin."

"Now, our man, Chad Ochocinco -- he tweets last week that he'd like someone to pick up his option," Casserly said. "Guess what Chad? They picked it up three years ago. You're under contract for next year, $6 million, not guaranteed. I wouldn't bring him back, that act has worn thin."

Ocho's status as an expensive and older wide receiver make a tough pickup at $6 million and it seems really unlikely that the team would re-sign Owens as well.

They have young, talented receiving options with Jordan Shipley and Jermaine Gresham, and adding one more younger star to the roster would give them significant weapons going forward without crushing the team's chemistry.

Whether Palmer can improve on his 2010 performance remains to be seen, but it appears the Bengals believe they're at least in contention with him at quarterback.

Yet another story lost in the Favre hoopla Sunday night: the Vikings finished with 196 yards rushing that game.

Randy Moss had just three catches Sunday, which was three more than Donald Driver. Driver’s streak of 133-straight games with a reception is over. (For what it’s worth, Drive was playing with a bum quad.)

Carson Palmer lost Sunday, but we’re guessing that his fantasy owners won. Palmer’s final numbers: 36/50 for 412 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions.

Jordan Shipley, in his first game back since suffering a concussion after T.J. Ward’s vicious and dirty hit, caught six passes for 131 yards and a touchdown.

John Abraham caused some problems for the Bengals. It wasn’t an utterly dominant performance, but Abraham recorded two sacks Sunday and consistently pushed the pocket.

The Bears were just 2/10 on third down against the Redskins. That means they had three times as many turnovers as third down conversions.

Ryan Torain ripped off 125 yards on 21 carries. The Bears were playing without injured outside linebacker Lance Briggs (ankle).

Bears guard Chris Williams finally got off the snide, catching his first pass of the season for a gain of four yards. (Without seeing the play, the guess here is that the ball was either tipped, or Cutler was remarkably errant on an attempted smoke screen to DeAngelo Hall.)

Albert Haynesworth was a menace for most of the afternoon. He finished with a sack and two tackles for a loss.

Matt Moore was 28/41 for 308 yards, two touchdowns and an interception (which, granted, was an ugly one returned by Ray McDonald for six points). All in all, that’s a mountain-moving quarterbacking performance for the Panthers.

Steve Smith had four catches for 50 yards in his first game back from an ankle injury (which he tweaked in the third quarter, by the way), but it was David Gettis who wore the receiver hat for the Panthers. The sixth-round rookie had eight receptions, 125 yards and two touchdowns.

Joe Flacco was just 16/31 against the Bills, but he did throw three touchdowns and no interceptions. None of those TD’s went to T.J. Houshmandzadeh. The former Pro Bowler was targeted just twice and finished with no catches.

Bengals wide receiver Jordan Shipley has been ruled out for Sunday’s game due to a concussion. The concussion was the result of an egregious cheap shot from Browns rookie safety T.J. Ward. If you haven’t seen the hit, take a look at it here:

Wednesday, the Associated Press reported that Ward was fined $15,000 for the hit. That is an outlandishly soft punishment that should leave the executives at 280 Park Avenue feeling embarrassed. Jets safety Eric Smith was fined $50,000 and suspended one game for his hit on Anquan Boldin in 2008.

Fortunately, Shipley was not injured as badly as Boldin was. But that doesn’t make Ward’s hit any better than Smith’s. Why is it that Shipley has to sit out Sunday but the man who delivered the dirty hit that caused the injury gets to play? Ward should have been suspended.

"I just tried to make a play and unfortunately he got hurt," Ward said, according to ESPN. "It's part of the violent game we play. If you play that position, it kind of comes with the territory."

It’s too early to declare Ward a dirty player. But this was certainly a dirty play. Eric Mangini defended Ward’s hit, calling it “an aggressive play.” This prompted Shipley’s teammate, Terrell Owens, to tell Chad Ochocinco on The T.Ocho Show (seriously), “Look who it's coming from. Probably 90 percent of his players don't like him [Mangini] anyway. I don't like him. We got to see him again anyway, so we'll see who's going to do some cheap shots next game. Hit me like that."

That's according to the official Bengals' Twitter feed, where they announced that "Antonio Bryant released along with Mike Windt."

The Maxwell adage about being "big enough to admit mistakes, smart enough to profit from them and strong enough to correct them" has never been so true -- the Bengals overpaid for Bryant (when they could have just signed eventual Bengal Terrell Owens in the first place) and once they got Owens and rookie Jordan Shipley on board, realized they didn't need him.

With his health issues clearly too much for him to overcome in order to get on the football field, they apparently decided the best move was simply to cut him and move on.

Bryant will go down as one of the worst Bengals' personnel decisions in a few years (which is almost epically impressive), because, even provided that they reach some sort of settlement with him, he never saw the field for Cincy. And while Andre Smith -- to name another recent blunder -- is a jiggling pile of draft day embarrassment, at least he wasn't the equivalent of flushing several million dollars down the toilet, like Bryant.Upd

Update (1:45) : I somehow forgot to mention that Laveranues Coles was cut by the Jets. Which means it's gotta be a fun day to say "I make front office decisions for Cincinnati."

Update (2:00) : Joe Reedy reports that LaMont Smith, Bryant's agent, intends to pursue Bryant's base salary of $1.55 million for this year, saying, "Our opposition is you can’t cut a guy if he’s hurt. We know what the rules are. We expect to be paid his salary for the year."

So that should be a very cordial discussion and an easy million and a half to get from the Bengals.

For more NFL news, rumors and analysis, follow @cbssportsnfl on Twitter and subscribe to our RSS feed.

I’m still a little confused about the interest shown to Terrell Owens by the Bengals. I wrote Monday about why owner Mike Brown likes him – Owens is still a good receiver and Brown considers himself a redeemer – and the Cincinnati Enquirer has reported that originally, Owens wanted $6 million of guaranteed money.

Today, TMZ tracked down Owens, and he said, “I know what I made last year ($6.5 million), so we’re trying to maybe cut that half and see what I can work with. I’m flexible.”

But even if Owens – who, at this point, isn’t going to the Rams or the Jets – makes $3 million of guaranteed money and gets an incentive-laden contract, I don’t quite see how he fits in with the Bengals.

There had been speculation that No. 2 WR Antonio Bryant – who signed a four-year, $28 million contract in the offseason – continues to have knee problems, but when I asked coach Marvin Lewis about that Monday, he said, “It has nothing to do with Antonio. We took steps in the spring to put Antonio into different spots, so he could play inside and play different spots. It’s not reflective of Antonio at all.”

So, say Bryant is healthy. With Chad Ochocinco as the No. 1 receiver and Bryant as No. 2, would Owens be content as the No. 3? Considering Andre Caldwell played the No. 3 spot relatively well last year and considering rookie Jordan Shipley will see plenty of playing time, how much is left over for Owens?

One positive in Owens’ favor: the Bengals don’t have much of a deep threat, and the coaches feel Owens showed last year in Buffalo that he still has the speed to be effective on go routes. Perhaps, that’s one option for him.

But remember this, it’s not like the Bengals were flinging the ball all over the field last year. Before he was injured, RB Cedric Benson was near the top of the league leaderboard in rushing attempts. There might be more passing plays added to the playbook this year, but this still won’t be the Bengals of a few years ago when it was the Carson Palmer-T.J. Houshmandzadeh-Chad Johnson show.

If the Bengals sign Owens, he’s sure to make the roster. That would leave Quan Cosby, Matt Jones and Jerome Simpson fighting for the final spot. Is Owens better than the three of them? Yes, probably. But is he worth a new contract? I’m just not sure I see the point.

UPDATE (5:34 p.m.): Pro Football Talk is reporting that Owens has signed with the Bengals.

UPDATE (5:46 p.m.): The Cincinnati Enquirer's Joe Reedy reports it's a one-year deal for $2 million base pay and with $2 million worth of incentives.